The Mutual Love Of Mash
by SereneCalamity
Summary: Jocelyn ends up inviting some old family friends that she hasn't seen in a while to their Thanksgiving dinner. Clace. Oneshot.


**I don't know what this is.**

 **I love mashed potato. Especially the cheesy kind.**

 **So...Here.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own the characters.**

Clarissa Morgenstern loved her parents.

She _adored_ them.

So many of her friends didn't have good relationships with their parents, and she could understand that. They lived on the upper east side of Manhattan, and all of their parents either spent all of their time working, and spending the rest of their time spending the money that they earned while working. A lot of them were already onto their second or third step parents—the step fathers always earned more money than the last, and the step mothers were always younger than the last.

But Clary was lucky. Her mother, Jocelyn Morgenstern, owned one of the most elite art galleries which had her chased by both artists and art lovers, and Valentine Morgenstern was on the highest paid plastic surgeons in the city, but both of them put her and her brother first. There had been a maid, of course, Dorothea Rollins was practically part of the family, given she had raised both Clary and Jonathan Morgenstern, but there hadn't been a trail of nannies and tutors like with most other families in their social group. Jocelyn was there on their first day of school and Valentine was there to take Clary to her first tap dancing class and Jonathan to his first soccer practice.

Yes, Clary loved her parents.

But sometimes she wished that they weren't quite so...Generous.

It sounded _bad_ but she didn't quite mean it like that. More that she had come home from college for Thanksgiving and found out that rather than just a small family dinner that she had been expecting, there were four other families there as well. Jonathan's girlfriend was there, Lydia Branwell, which was fine, because her and Clary were prety much best friends. Then there was Lydia's family, the Branwells, and the Lightwoods, and the Garroways and then there were the Herondales. Clary knew the other families well but the Herondales had moved away when Clary was seven and she didn't really remember them. Apparently they had just moved back, and didn't have any plans over the holidays, so of course, Jocelyn had invited them.

Jace Herondale was hot, and she was guessing that he wouldn't try and pull on her braids or want to throw blocks at her anymore, but he spent most of his time on his phone.

So did Alexander Lightwood, actually, and they kept grinning and making weird faces at each other, so she was guessing that they were texting each other.

There were a couple of chefs and cooks in the kitchen, and they served up a meal that kept on coming, and Clary was glad that she and Lydia had changed into sweatpants after the first course, even if pretty much everyone else was in nicer clothes. Jonathan had laughed when he saw them in matching sweatpants and Jace had looked up from his phone and seen them in their pressed, festival blouses finished off with grey sweats and he had grinned. The second and third course came out, and most of the people around the table were on their fourth or fifth drink, and then they all took a break before dessert was brought out.

"Okay, I'm just gonna go get a refill," Clary said as she picked up her wine glass, downing it quickly. Lydia gave her a knowing look and picked up her own drink, snuggling back into Jonathan's side. Isabelle was facetiming with Simon Lewis, her boyfriend, and Alec was texting away furiously. Clary wasn't sure where Jace had gone, maybe upstairs to the bathroom, and it wasn't really something that she spent much time thinking about as she headed toward the kitchen. Most of the cooks had left, there was only Dot and one other girl in the kitchen, and Dot looking up with a smile as Clary came in, her wine glass in her hand.

"You're lucky we have leftovers—we had more guests than usual," Dot told her as she nodded into the adjoined scullery. Clary grinned, putting down her wine glass on one of the benches and skipping into the small room, where there were bowls of leftovers covered in clear plastic wrap lined up along the bench. They hadn't yet been transferred into containers to go in the fridge—which Valentine and Jonathan would sneak in to eat in the middle of the night—and Clary picked up the big metal, silver bowl where the plastic wrap had all fogged up from the heat still coming off the contents.

Clary opened up one of the drawers and pulled out a spoon—one of the big serving spoons that would not be at all ladylike to eat with in front of their guests—and then bounced up so that she was sitting up on centre island. She swung her legs and jiggled her shoulders excitedly as she peeled the plastic wrap off and revealed the cheesy mashed potato underneath.

" _Yuuuuuus_ ," she hummed out under her breath as she buried the spoon into the mashed potato and then shoved as much as she could into her mouth, which was about half the heaped spoon. She let out a loud moan of contentment and closed her eyes as she chewed and was partway through swallowing when someone cleared their throat and she tipped her head back forward and opened her eyes.

Jace was standing there, an amused smile on his face.

Then his eyes dropped to the bowl that was resting on her lap, and she could see the interest on his face.

Clary swallowed the rest of her mouthful and tightened her arm protectively around the bowl, eyes narrowing at him.

"Yes?" She asked, noting the way he kept on looking at the mashed potato.

"I was..." Jace trailed off, eyes shifting to the spoon in her hand and then back up to her face, his eyebrows lifting and a grin spreading across his face. "Super into mash, huh?"

"Cheesy mash potato is my _life_ ," Clary replied adamantly, not even a little embarrassed about the serving spoon in her hand, still piled half full of potato. Jace glanced around the scullery and then nodded at a set of drawers.

"Spoons in there?" He asked.

"Yeeees," Clary dragged out the word, although she didn't look happy with her answer. Jace grinned and went over to the drawer, opening up and taking out a spoon. It wasn't a serving spoon, like Clary's one, but it still proved a threat as he moved over to stand in front of her and waved it around in a question. "Fine, you can share my potato, but don't be getting too greedy!" Clary conceded.

"Greedy?" Jace snorted as he dipped his spoon into the potato. " _I'm_ not the one with the serving spoon!"

"And no judgments!" Clary quickly added, making Jace laugh.

"No judgement," he repeated back to her, wiggling his eyebrows as her and Clary relaxed a little and they were quiet for a few moments as they both ate the mashed potato. It was luke warm, which some may argue wasn't the best way to eat it and Clary would never accept it while eating actual _dinner_ , but it was the best way to eat it after a meal. "Is this a tradition for you?"

"Thanksgiving?" Clary wrinkled her nose at him and her eyes twinkled. "I believe it's a tradition for _a lot_ of families."

"I meant stuffing your face with leftover mash," Jace rolled his eyes playfully at her.

"Hey!" Clary jabbed her spoon in his direction, eyes narrow. "That sounded an awful lot like judgement!"

"No, no," he shook his head quickly, and he couldn't stop his amused smile. "Of course not." He looked genuine, eyes wide, and Clary couldn't help but grin at him. They were quiet again, but only for another mouthful, and then Clary spoke up again.

"Yeah, so maybe I have a slight weakness for cheesy mash," she grinned.

"Not a bad weakness to have," he shrugged.

"Specifically Dot's mash," Clary continued conversationally. "She used to make it without the cheese, but I used to help her out a lot in the kitchen, and I added some cheese to it when we were making it, and then it stuck. She acts as though it's a big surprise when there's leftovers, but I know she always makes me extra, _especially_ at Thanksgiving," she smiled as she wiggled around where she was sitting before tipping her head toward him. "What about you?"

"What about me?" Jace asked.

"You just go skulking around peoples kitchens when they invite you over for a meal?" She asked with an arched eyebrow and he let out a laugh.

"Depends," he replied.

"On what?"

"Whether I'm looking for the pretty redhead," he answered with a cheeky smile and Clary rolled her eyes, a little surprised by his comment but not completely thrown by it.

"Surprised you noticed, given you barely looked up from your phone," she sassed back and Jace made a face.

"Yeah...There's a chat between me, Alec and Alec's boyfriend, Mags, and Mags is _constantly_ having crisis'," Jace rolled his eyes fondly. "And then he gets shitty if we don't reply to his messages. It's okay though, because it's always hilarious and not at all life threatening, despite what he may say _every single time_ ," he snorted. Clary had met Magnus Bane a couple of times, but given she went to college in California, and Alec and Magnus were here in New York, and she and Alec weren't particularly close, she hadn't had heaps to do with him. He was good looking, and funny, from what Clary remembered.

"What was this crisis about?" Clary asked. Jace's lips pressed together and it was obvious that he was trying not to laugh.

"He tipped too much food dye into the mac and cheese," he smirked and Clary let out a surprised laugh. "It had gone from..." he scrunched up his nose to remember the wording of the message. "A light lavender to an angry eggplant."

"Why was he putting food dye into it in the first place?!" She exclaimed, a smile spreading across her face.

"Because according to Mags, _everything_ could use a little extra colour," Jace replied, letting out a laugh as he shook his head. Clary could help but laugh along with him, and she liked the loose feeling in her shoulders, probably from the wine and definitely helped by all the food she was eating. The company wasn't turning out to be too bad either. "So...Alec said that you're out in California for college?" He asked.

"Yeah," Clary noted. "Studying art history, working toward being a teacher."

"I was actually studying at Cal State—"

"That's where I am!" Clary pointed out.

"Cool," Jace gave her a small smile. "I took a year off, my grandma was sick and my parents were really close to her—I was too, so I wanted to be there to help with...Everything. After she passed, they moved back here, so I helped with that as well. I'm going back next semester though."

"I'm sorry—about your grandma," Clary offered with a sympathetic expression.

"It's okay, she was old," Jace shrugged. "She lived a good life, and she loved that everyone came together to look after her in the end, having all the family around her." Clary nodded, and they both went quiet again for a few beats.

"So I guess we'll be seeing each other around a lot more then, yeah?" Clary asked as she scraped her spoon around the side of the bowl.

"Yeah," Jace wiggled his eyebrows at her. "Guess we will." Clary couldn't hold back her grin, and she felt her cheeks redden a little as they both went back to the mashed potato, the quiet comfortable between them.

 **Let me know what you think x**


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